bam - saving memories

bargeboo: its been over 2 years since the devastating earthquake in bam. catastrophic events such as the 2004 tsunami still get occasional coverage in the mainstream media and justly so because the scale of that tragedy is not comparable to what happened in bam. however on a local scale and based on the fact that this earthquake happened in such a small city where 41000 of 120000 of the inhabitants were killed. it also managed to destroy a historical monument - arg-e-bam - which had managed to survivie such madness as the invation of the mongolians in the 2nd century.

for these and many other reasons such as what happened in a similarly terrible earthquake in the 80s in north of iran, I continue to keep an eye on that city and follow the news on it as much as it becomes available. in my many searches i came across the story of one lady photographer - parisa damandan who has embarked on a massive project of saving negatives from among the rubbles of various photography studios in bam. she has titled her project clearly enough the "bam photographic rescue project". be sure to look through her journal as well, part 1 and part 2 . she also has a book or two or her credit and has also been on other interesting projects such as portrat photographs from isfahan.

in the age where feeling powerless has become a disease of the modern world, what she has begun and continues to do is inspiring to say the least. socially and emotinoally it is quite a valuable endeavor  if only one photograph manages to give meaning to an orphaned child who desperatly searches for links to her/his lost family her work i feel will be worth it. i am sure the historical ramifications of her project is quite clear as well.